Flight International: What's it like to fly on an Airbus A380? First 'passengers' find out with Early Long Flights - by Max Kingsley-Jones

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What's it like to fly on an Airbus A380? First 'passengers' find out with Early Long Flights - by Max Kingsley-Jones

The Airbus A380 operated its first fully representative "passenger" flights last week when around 1,900 people travelled on the ultra large aircraft during the four- flight early long flight (ELF) test programme. The ELF programme began at 09:58 on 4 September, when development aircraft MSN002 (F-WXXL) took off from Toulouse with 474 passengers on board. The first flight lasted 7h, and flight time was gradually increased during the three successive flights last week, culminating in the 15h operation that was due to be completed on 8 September.During the flights, each of which operated with a full load of passengers as round-trips from Toulouse routeing over Europe and the Mediterranean, the occupants - Airbus employees and cabin systems specialists - put the cabin through its paces. The flights operated as a standard airline service, with flight attendants provided by Lufthansa.

According to the Airbus deputy media relations manager David Voskhul, who travelled on the third test flight, the A380 passenger experience was good: "The aircraft felt quite stable and the cabin was quiet in the cruise. I hardly noticed that we had started taxiing." Voskhul adds that the boarding and disembarking process was "very quick" despite the need to use airstairs.